Some widgets have options that are only available when you get a premium membership.

We've split the page into zones!

Certain widgets can only be added to certain zones.

"Why," you ask? Because we want profile pages to have freedom of customization, but also to have some consistency. This way, when anyone visits a deviant, they know they can always find the art in the top left, and personal info in the top right.

People have been coming to me asking me for my thoughts on this, so I'll just say it here:

I can't help but feel a bit concerned for the current art community at large.

There has been a recent case of an artist that even I admire rather greatly known to be referencing and copying imagery directly without citing the source, and then using the output work for profit.

I'm not going to take any sides on any of the matter. I personally feel the proper steps are being taken on the artist's part to rectify the situation and continue on a better course. We're all human, we make mistakes, and we all deserve second chances in whatever we do, whether it's subjectively wrong or right.

But the level of passiveness as to what has been actually done is disturbing to me.

I understand supporting artists when they've been seemingly vilified by the masses of the internets, that's natural to do. And we as artists appreciate that kind of support when it happens. By the Nine, I know it has happened to me many times in the past where I've been the target of that kind of heat.

But we need to understand what's ethical and what isn't, completely unbiased from our feelings toward said artist.

Using reference is completely fine. We all need to somehow reference something at least one point in our lives in order to understand how to translate that in whatever piece we're working on. It's also used to learn how things work. There's no denying that. I've done it when I was learning. Even though in my opinion it's a crutch to copy things directly without trying to draw it at a different angle or with more exaggeration, but it's completely ethical to use reference.

Plagiarism is a huge issue, in fact, one of the largest issues that plagues the art community entirely. And what I find so disturbing is that there is a huge mass of appreciators turning a blind eye to what actually went on and writing it off as "just hating". That is not the case.

Plagiarism is so serious, you can get kicked out of art schools for doing it. Heck, it's not even put up with in regular schools where you have to write theses or reuse visual video content of someone else's work. But it's more serious in the art scene. This is where we need to understand using reference versus copying imagery for profit.

It IS wrong. Very wrong.

However, no matter what I say will not really influence how anyone would feel about this whole matter, but I'm just stating facts here: There's no valor or honor in copying an image of another person's work, not citing reference, and making money of it. No way. No how. And no matter how much we love the work of said artist or if their versions are better than the original, we can't accept this behavior.

Also, this is not a question of fanart either. Fanart is using an established character and coming up with your own imagery or unique take on it. Understand the differences between the two. We all know selling fanart is a huge legal gray area and a lot of us (myself included) are guilty of it, but directly copying a picture of an established character like a Goku drawing from Toriyama, rendering it differently and altering proportion slightly, and then gaining profit off of it is not the way to go about things. It may not hurt your fanbase, but it will definitely hurt your credibility from actual professionals in the industry, who knows the difference between copying and using reference.

In the end, I still very much support this artist and I feel they are very skilled, and I'm sure the artist is taking steps to correct the matter... At the same time though, I can't be a rabid fanboy.